diff --git a/swh/core/api/__init__.py b/swh/core/api/__init__.py
--- a/swh/core/api/__init__.py
+++ b/swh/core/api/__init__.py
@@ -159,6 +159,13 @@
         base_url = url if url.endswith('/') else url + '/'
         self.url = base_url
         self.session = requests.Session()
+        adapter = requests.adapters.HTTPAdapter(
+            max_retries=kwargs.get('max_retries', 3),
+            pool_connections=kwargs.get('pool_connections', 20),
+            pool_maxsize=kwargs.get('pool_maxsize', 100))
+        self.session.mount('http://', adapter)
+        self.session.mount('https://', adapter)
+
         self.timeout = timeout
         self.chunk_size = chunk_size